When most kids play checkup, they make up what they’re doing. But Collin Kratzer knows more than most kids do about going to the doctor.

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At 4 years, he’s already been to the hospital more times than most people will go in a lifetime. He’s battled through at least six rounds of chemotherapy, two relapses and 28 sessions of radiation; at last check, doctors could not find any new evidence of the brain cancer.

His whole family joins him in the battle, but it hasn’t been easy.

“Your first thought is how are you going to fight it? Your second thought is how are you going to pay for it, right?” said Bill Kratzer, Collin's father.

The Kratzers are a Four Diamonds family; they just got back from Penn State’s THON weekend, their third year there.

Part of the record money raised, more than $12 million this year, will help families like the Kratzers pay medical bills for things their insurance won’t cover. It’s a service they’ve been using almost since Collin’s first diagnosis.

“I know other kids in other states who don’t have a resource like this and their families have lost their homes. It’s overwhelming to think about and you don’t want to think about that stuff when you’re fighting for the life of your child, so it’s huge,” said Jenn Kratzer, the boy's mother.

The support from the Four Diamonds fundraisers has kept the Kratzers together, stronger and focused on getting Collin healthy.

“Now I look back on it and they’re saviors for our family,” said Bill.

It’s also allowed them to spread awareness of the disease they knew very little about until it became a part of their daily lives.

“Everybody knows what pink is; gold is the color of pediatric cancer and not enough people know that,” said Jenn.

So they will continue to be a part of THON until, they say, there’s a cure.

Since the Four Diamonds Fund’s first year in 1972, more than 2,000 families have been helped.